ARCADIA, Calif. – Union Strike, the winner of the Grade 1 Del Mar Debutante on Sept. 3, worked five furlongs in 1:00.80 on Saturday in preparation for the $2 million Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies at Santa Anita on Nov. 5.

Union Strike was held out of the Grade 1 Chandelier Stakes at Santa Anita on Oct. 1 because of sore shins, but trainer Shelbe Ruis said on Saturday that the filly has recovered.

“There was nothing that major going on,” Ruis said. “It was the right thing to do. I think she’ll be ready.”

Runaway Lute, who won his first two starts against New York-breds before finishing sixth in the Grade 1 Hopeful, will return to statebred company for the $250,000 Sleepy Hollow Stakes on Oct. 22, trainer Gary Contessa said.

Runaway Lute won a maiden race and then the Rockville Centre Stakes by a combined 20 3/4 lengths during the Belmont spring/summer meet.

He was freshened for the Hopeful, where he had trouble from start to finish while getting beat 17 1/4 lengths. He fell past the finish line but was uninjured.

Comfort, the runner-up to Frosted in the Grade 1 Whitney, is sidelined with “mild to moderate bone bruising,” said Aron Wellman, president of Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners.

Wellman said Comfort was diagnosed with the problem by Dr. Larry Bramlage shortly after he won the Seattle Slew Stakes at Belmont on Sept. 10. Bramlage recommended the horse be given 60 days off.

Curalina, the three-time Grade 1-winning stakes filly, will be pre-entered in both the Breeders’ Cup Distaff and the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint, said Aron Wellman, president of Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners, which owns the filly.

Curalina won her maiden at the Filly and Mare Sprint distance of seven furlongs and won the Grade 1 Acorn, a one-turn mile, as a 3-year-old.

Curalina is also a multiple graded stakes winner at the Distaff distance of 1 1/8 miles.

ELMONT, N.Y. – War Dancer was favored in last year’s Grade 3 Knickerbocker Stakes despite having not won a race in the previous 17 months. War Dancer finished seventh.

On Monday, when Belmont hosts a 10-race Columbus Day card, War Dancer likley will not be favored in the $200,000 Knickerbocker, but he will coming in off a win.

War Dancer drew the outside post in a nine-horse field entered Friday for the Knickerbocker, run at 1 1/8 miles over the inner turf course.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – If perfection is possible, Mitchell Murrill might have found it with the opening of the Keeneland fall meet Friday – just like the thousands of fans who turned out.

Under bright skies and ideal weather, Murrill never had a straw in his path when guiding You Bought Her to a 5 1/2-length romp in the first race of the 17-day meet.

“It was a clean trip on a really nice mare,” said Murrill, a 22-year-old native of Mobile, Ala. “It’s a great feeling to win the first race of the meet.”

The stakes winner Bowies Hero will be favored to win his second consecutive stakes in Monday’s $100,000 Zuma Beach Stakes for 2-year-olds at a mile on turf at Santa Anita. On the same program, the stakes winners Con Te Partiro and Happy Mesa are expected to run in the $100,000 Surfer Girl Stakes for 2-year-old fillies at a mile on turf.

The races could produce runners for the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf and Juvenile Fillies Turf here on Nov. 4.

Jockey Edwin Maldonado is targeting a comeback in early 2017 from severe rib injuries sustained in a training accident at Del Mar last month.

Maldonado said on Thursday that he is in the midst of a four-month recovery and will begin physical therapy and rehabilitation in November.

“I think it will be four months,” he said in a phone interview. “I’m not quite sure yet. I’ll go see the doctor every month. I start my physical therapy in a month.”

Win the Space, third behind California Chrome and Dortmund in the Grade 1 Awesome Again Stakes last Saturday, remains a candidate for the Breeders’ Cup Classic, trainer George Papaprodromou said.

Papaprodromou said a decision will be made after discussions in the coming weeks with owner Rustin Kretz. He said the Classic is more likely than the $1 million BC Dirt Mile on Nov. 4.

“We’re leaning toward the Classic,” Papaprodromou said. “It will be a smaller field, and I prefer that.”

Forevamo has been turned out at WinStar Farm for rehabilitation since finishing sixth in the Aug. 6 West Virginia Derby. The 3-year-old Forevamo was the runner-up in the Grade 2 Risen Star and Grade 3 Pat Day Mile.

“There’s been no surgery, no nothing,” said trainer Al Stall Jr. “We’re just letting him grow up. Ideally, we’ll have him back in the entries at Fair Grounds early next year.”